“No Johnny,” I replied, “It’s Jesus’ church.  And he’s my boss.”

Without skipping a beat, Johnny responded, “He’s everyone’s boss.”

Then my three-year-old, Joshua, started pointing to everyone in the Carl’s Jr. restaurant saying, “Jesus is their boss and their boss and their boss…”

I guess my boys understand discipleship pretty well!

Isn’t everything better when we’re not alone? It sure is for me.

As Dr. Edwards put it, those four words, I am with you, have the power to transform despair into courage.

I believe that God must have the same experience.

“My child, do not despise the Lord’s discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the Lord reproves the one he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.” Proverbs 3:11-12

I wouldn’t bother to give Lydia drops if I didn’t care about her well-being.  And God wouldn’t bother to discipline and teach us unless he loved us…  It’s no fun, but it helps to know that it comes from love.  Some day, Lydia will understand that too.

Instead I’m looking at a popular interpretation of Revelation 13:16-17

“He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.” – Rev. 13:16-17

A number of people have looked at the idea that people would need the “mark of the beast” to buy or sell and have decided that it looks a lot like a barcode with a unique ID on it, or more recently, an RFID chip (a chip that can be read remotely with a reader) implanted under the person’s skin. Imagine the day when you can’t use a credit card and photo ID because the implanted chip is more secure…

The California State Senate passed a bill making it illegal for an employer to require an employee to “get chipped” as they call it. Check out the LA Times article. You might think that this is ridiculous and couldn’t possibly happen – except that it has already. Reportedly , in early 2006, Citywatcher.com required its data center employees to be implanted for security reasons (an article on it) – they can keep their jobs if they don’t get chipped, but they can’t work in the data center.

Now not everyone agrees that the “mark of the beast” is about the future. Verse 18 says, “This calls for wisdom. If anyone has insight, let him calculate the number of the beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666.” One creates a person’s “number” in Hebrew by putting together the numbers of the letters of his/her name. So it looks less like everyone being implanted with a unique number and more like everyone being marked with the same number, a number that the reader should be able to match up to a person.

Ragardless of whether “chipping” people is the “Mark of the Beast,” it’s creepy and I’m glad the California Legislature is acting on it. At least people shouldn’t have to be chipped.

I could just stay on them all the time – telling them “don’t do that,” “stop it!” “put it back” over and over and over…

Now I’m not recommending laissez-faire parenting. But I realized couple of days ago, that I don’t have to do that. I can let some of this little stuff go. Otherwise, the kids will just learn to tune me out. Then when something big comes, they won’t even hear me. Not to mention that it’s hard to feel loved by someone who’s always criticizing you about something.

Another thing Eleanor and I do is to focus on whatever issue is most pressing at the time. We currently have zero tolerance on a habit Joshua has developed. When we tell Johnny not to do something, Johnny immediately does it. Right now, it’s straight to “time out” every time he does it.

It occurs to me that this is the same way the Holy Spirit works on us. God could easily say no to me every second or two for some action or thought. But instead God seems to focus on one area in our lives at a time. One day something seems OK and the next day the Holy Spirit is on it until it’s gone.

Kind of nice that God doesn’t beat us up as often as would be justified. It’s a lot easier to feel loved this way, and I don’t have to crawl into a hole and hide feeling like there’s no hope. There is hope as long as God is working.

At four-and-a-half years old, my son Johnny has reached the stage in his development where he works furiously to create indestructible sandcastles.  he had a great one going one afternoon.

“The water wins all battles,” I told Johnny.  “We can delay it for a while, but eventually the water wins.”

Johnny didn’t believe it.  He put a tree branch in place and dug a moat to catch the water- pretty good civil engineering for someone who isn’t five yet.  And it looked pretty good.

When we returned the next morning, some of the castle was still there!  But we happened to witness the moment when the waves wiped out the castle.  Because we had talked about it, it wasn’t crushing to Johnny.  He seemed to have a moment of enlightenment…

Johnny’s predicament came to me when I was thinking about my own situation.  God has been inviting me to trust and encouraging me to spend more time in prayer.  But something inside me resists.  I know that I can trust God, and I make decisions according to that belief, but I still feel the stress.  It occurred to me that I am expending huge amounts of energy to hold God back – just like Johnny’s engineering efforts to keep the water away from his castle.  For some reason, I am working hard to reinforce my castle’s defenses.

God really does win all battles.  All I can do is resist in a futile effort to keep God from redecorating the beach.  What would it be like to trust so completely that if God wanted to wipe out a sandcastle in my life, I would be OK with it?  I can imagine it – and sometimes, I can live it – but much of the time, I cause myself unnecessary hardship by resisting God.  What a waste of energy and what needless wear and tear on my body and mind!  All you can do trying to stop God is hurt yourself.

I am going to work on letting go…  on allowing God to redesign the landscape as He sees fit and save my energy for more important things like ministry and spending time with my wife and kids.

Want to join me?  Leave a comment.

The house we wanted to make an offer on is still on the market, but we don’t have a time-frame for any of this, and it’s all a bit crazy.

God says, “Be still and know that I am God.”  (Psalm 46:10)

I say, “How does that help me get this stuff done in time?”

God says, “What do you mean, in time?”

“If we don’t get all of these things done, we won’t be able to get our house!”

“What makes you think that’s your house?  I have plenty of houses, and you’ll get what you need,” God answers.

“OK, but this concrete guy was supposed to fix this a long time ago.  He’s not standing up to what he said he’d do, and I only had one vacation week to do all my projects to get us ready.”

“You’re not listening.  I have this under control.  Trust me.”

“OK.  I’ll let it go for now.  But you’re going to have to help me.”  Even as I speak this in my mind, I know arrogant that is.  God doesn’t have to do anything.  But if God is asking me to trust, God will come through.  I can count on that.  Still, I need help to feel it.

I’ll let you know how it goes!

And we have finished some of them!  We bought and installed a new stove; we chose and ordered new flooring for the dining room; we removed, fixed, and reinstalled a sticking sliding door; we planted climbing plants and installed trellises on the back patio; we built and installed a top cover for the bathroom medicine cabinet so the wiring is safely enclosed; and we had begun some other projects such as painting, drywall taping, and stucco repair.  The list was actually a bit too long, and I’m doing a wedding this week so we were a bit stressed.

But that was nothing.  Just after lunch, Eleanor was resting and I was reading something on the computer when Johnny came in covered in paint.  I went outside to find that he had opened a gallon of white primer in the garage and used two Frisbees to bring paint out to the lawn to put it on the door Eleanor had been painting.  There was a huge puddle of paint in the garage and our new patio was covered with multiple trails of paint between the garage and the lawn.  He had also painted several things along the way.  I wish I had taken a picture of it, but we were really concerned about getting the paint cleaned up fast before too much of it dried.  Paint dries fast when it’s 102 degrees out.

We spent all afternoon with scrub brushes, dish soap, and a pressure washer trying to get back to where we were yesterday, and we’re not there yet.

Are Eleanor and I frustrated?  Oh yeah.  Am I upset and disappointed with my son who went and did a bunch of things we’ve repeatedly told him not to do?  Sure.

But sometimes, something that pushes you so far that it’s completely impossible to execute your plans is a little bit freeing.  When our goal was still in sight, I was feeling a lot of stress about executing according to plan.  Now, even if we make no mistakes, we can’t finish it all in the time we have so I can be free!

Now I have to rely on God to get me through this.  The idea that I was in control was an illusion in the first place and now it’s been dispelled.  Will I sleep better tonight with everything shot to pieces than I did last night when we were on track?  I’ll have to let you know.  Part of me is experiencing the freedom and another part is struggling to regain control.  It’s too soon to tell which will win.

Some people live in that reality all the time.  In truth, we rely on God’s power and grace and just to get through every day.  Some people who live with big challenges are in touch with that all the time.  I personally am not always aware of it, but I am today.

“Why do you say that, Johnny?” Eleanor, my wife, asked.

“Because he leads me in temptation,” Johnny replied matter-of-factly, referring to the line in the Lord’s Prayer – “lead us not into temptation.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I keep praying and praying but every day I’m tempted.  Like splashing water in the sink.” (Johnny has had some trouble lately where he spends ten minutes playing in the water in the bathroom sink instead of washing his hands.)

When we recovered from the shock that our four-year-old was doing some decent theological thinking, we had to talk to him a bit and assure him that God does hear his prayers, and that some amount of temptation is just a part of life – that even Jesus experienced it.

But Johnny will have more examples of “unanswered prayer” over time. I have found that the most common ways of responding to that problem are not helpful.

1) “It’s God’s will.” True, some prayers aren’t answered the way we’d like because God has other plans. I could pray to win the lottery and God might know that if I won the lottery I’d become an insufferable materialist (it’s just hypothetical God!) But what about a child dying. What does it mean for that to be God’s will? What about terrorists flying planes into the World Trade Center? Is “God’s will” the right answer there? I don’t think so. At some point, we have to acknowledge that we live in a fallen world and that crummy stuff is going to happen as a result of people’s bad choices and the effects of living in a sin-soaked world.

2) To get around the “God’s will” problem, many people decide that God just can’t be bothered with our affairs. God merely “cries with us.” That is part of what God does, but it’s not sufficient. Now God isn’t powerful anymore. God “can’t” help us. That isn’t biblical! How does that mesh with James 4:2 “You do not have, because you do not ask” or the words of Jesus himself, for example, “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.” I guess you have to “spiritualize” that. But I don’t read the New Testament that way. I read that we serve a powerful God, indwelt by a powerful Holy Spirit.

3) “God answers all prayers, but sometimes the answer is no.” I hate that. In much of his teaching on prayer, Jesus tells us to keep coming to God again and again and again. Why would we do that if there’s some simple yes or no answer process? I believe instead that God answers all prayers – sometimes by changing the world and sometimes by changing our hearts. If we keep coming to God long enough, we will stay in conversation with God and in the end, God will either give us what we ask or will change the desires of our hearts to fit with God’s will. That has been my experience. Not that it happens right away. I’ve had things take years before my constant coming to God actually changes my heart. See Luke 11:5-13 and Luke 18:1-8.

If we reject those three statements, we don’t get any easy answers – God wanted it that way, God can’t do anything about that, God said no. We have to deal with the ambiguity and mystery. And it would be unbearable except for one thing… God loves us. God loves us more than we can understand. If we trust that we serve and pray to an infinitely loving God, then it’s easier to live in a world where things don’t work as we think they should. But we’re called to keep coming, to stay in conversation with God, even to wrestle with God! Our God has chosen to be influenced by us – that’s what prayer is – so we might even prevail!

Keep the faith, friends, and trust that the Lord is with us – even in the really painful and messy times. That’s what we plan to teach Johnny as he grows up.

Check out the Washington Post article to read more.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
       neither are your ways my ways,”
       declares the LORD.
“As the heavens are higher than the earth,
       so are my ways higher than your ways
       and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
- Isaiah 55:8-9

Our church is making an important decision about whether we should purchase a piece of property in Southport – an area of new development here in West Sacramento.  Eleanor and I visited the land and prayed over it.  We could feel the potential of the ministry that could be done there.

I’d like to go to our church board (Session) and say, “Let’s do this!  Can’t you see the possibilities?!?”  But that’s not my job.  This is not a nonnegotiable.  It may or may not be the best way for out church to move forward, but unless the board wants it, we can’t go ahead.

In this and other areas, I have to trust that God is at work.  This passage from Isaiah showed up today on our church website as the daily scripture reading.  Nice timing.  I have to trust that God will work through the session.  My job is to help them consider it properly and encourage them to seek God’s wisdom.  The rest is up to them!  God’s ways truly are above my ways and God’s thoughts truly are above my thoughts.  I’ll let you know what happens next.

It turns out that the traditional way to produce the ashes for the worship service is to save some of the palm fronds from the previous year’s Palm Sunday and burn them to create the ashes.

There’s something deep and true about it…  Palm Sunday is when we remember Jesus’ trimphant entry into Jerusalem.  Everyone was singing praises, throwing down their coats before him, and waving palm branches as they would to welcome royalty.  But within days, they were shouting to ”crucify him.”  It is the symbol of these feigned praises that we burn and mark ourselves with as we enter into a time of reflection and self-examination.

Are we doomed to repeat this cycle endlessly, or can the power of the Risen Christ burn away our pretension and lead us into an authentic faith that can endure?  That is the promise of Easter.  But we can’t get there until we walk the road to the cross.

He looked at me uncomfortably and started gesturing to another employee. I decided that he probably spoke only Spanish so I started talking to him in Spanish, but he kept gesturing to the young woman behind the counter. I finally asked, “No habla español?” He said “No.” “No español.” And he proceeded to ask the woman he had been pointing to to translate for us. I told her what I wanted to communicate. Then she translated it into Spanish for him!

This man was so certain that someone who looked like me couldn’t speak a word of Spanish that he didn’t hear it when I spoke it. He must even have convinced himself that I was so inept that I meant “ingles” when I said “español.”

Surprisingly, this isn’t the first time I’ve experienced exactly the same thing. Now I’m not fluent in Spanish, but I can communicate just fine… if the other person is listening!

How often does that happen to us? We’re so confident of our assessment of a situation that we can’t see anything different even when it’s right their in our face…

And what does it tell us about relationships between different racial-ethnic groups in the United States? Here in California there is no longer a majority racial-ethnic group, and very soon it will be Hispanics. But the experience of Spanish speakers has been so consistent that some of them can’t even conceive of the idea that I might speak a few words o Spanish. That’s a shame.

Because of a dedicated Christian who wants to build bridges, our church is getting ready to start a Spanish-speaking ministry. It’s a great opportunity to create community and undo some isolation and mistrust between God’s children. We’re hoping to teach the congregation a handful of basic phrases to help us build the other side of the bridge. Pray for us! I believe that this is exactly what Christians are called to do. I’m sure that this will be uncomfortable for a few of our older members, but they’ll adjust. As long as this is what God is calling us to do, and I believe it is, God will enable us to do it!

The options seem to be to cut back our ministry significantly –  which would be a big step backwards – or to trust that our needs for ministry will be met somehow.  But where is the line between trust in God and foolishness?

I have prayed and asked people to pray.  God has been acting in our church, and I don’t believe that he’s done with us.  Still, we have to make a decision before the end of the year.  Well, I received a message today.

Johnny was “reading” his children’s Bible this morning, and he came up to a page with a picture of a fish with a coin in its mouth.  “What’s this Daddy?” he asked.

It was the story of Jesus and Peter paying the Temple tax.  They didn’t have any money so Jesus told Peter, “go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”  (Matthew 17:24-27)

The children’s Bible stated confidently that we can trust God to provide for our needs.  The message?  If Jesus can provide for monetary needs with a fish, won’t he provide for our church?  There are many possible ways for God to provide.  There were 199 people in worship on Sunday.  Can’t God move them to give?  Or provide some other means of support?

Johnny pointing out this story as I was struggling this morning really felt like a message from God.  “Don’t worry, Steve.  We’ll get through this together.”  I look forward to telling you how it works out.

If you read this posting, please pray for Trinity Church.  “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” – James 5:16b

I had a sense of a call to vocational ministry (that’s seminary speak for doing ministry for a living) as early as college, but the place that I really learned to understand my call was Sunnyvale Presbyterian Church. They’re celebrating their 50 anniversary this year, and they invited those church members who have become pastors to write about their experience. I’m sharing mine with you so that you can see how many different people and programs God used in order to grow me enough to be ready to answer the call to ministry. As you read it, think about the “little things” that you may have done and how – taken together with the actions of others – they can change people’s lives.

I came to Sunnyvale as a software engineer and left as a Minister of the Word and Sacrament. As I looked around at San Francisco Theological Seminary, I saw a number of people I knew from church so I joked with Steve Harrington that there must be something in the water. “Yes,” he replied, “It’s the baptismal water.”

Your church and church leadership did a number of things that helped me to find my call. When my wife Eleanor and I first came to the church, we met the Graffts, who kept checking in with us whenever they saw us. Then when I had an early sense of the call to ministry and felt overwhelmed by it, Dale Bracey encouraged me to take it slowly. As a result of our meeting, I joined the choir. That group supported Eleanor and me and helped us find community as well as a sense of serving God through music.

When that no longer seemed enough, I grew in ministry further by working with the high schoolers of C.L.U.E. and the other adult volunteers there. There’s nothing like working with youth to help you work out your own stuff! Next, Eleanor and I deepened our relationship with Christ and our understanding of God’s word in the two-year Crossways class. Finally, when I was ready to seek what radical thing God might be leading me to, Steve Wilde was there to walk through it with me. Steve met with me every Wednesday morning and then drove up to San Anselmo with me to visit some seminary classes and meet some of the seminary students, faculty, and administrators. He was supportive along the way in seminary too. And Steve trusted me enough to give me responsibility for Youth Sunday one year – truly a transformative experience.

Later, Steve Harrington coached me. Then session approved my entry into the ordination process, Sven Jensen, my session liaison, kept tabs on me – and Eleanor – to make sure we were doing OK with many lunches after church. He represented the church well and made us feel cared for.

Sunnyvale was also where we learned to tithe. Without handing over the power of money to God, I would never have been able to give up my Silicon Valley salary and upward mobility.

These may all have seemed like small things to the people involved, but God worked mightily through them, moving me from where I was to where I was meant to be. While I experienced many satisfying moments in my career in the computer business, I never had “this is what I was made to do” moments until I had chances to preach and lead worship.

I am truly grateful for the members, pastors, and staff of Sunnyvale Presbyterian Church. Your faithfulness as disciples of Jesus Christ made the ministry I do every day possible. I thank God for your gift to me, to my family, and to Christ’s Church.

Love in Christ,

The Rev. Steve Whitney

Of course Eleanor’s and my eyes welled up a bit. We thanked Johnny and gave him a big hug.

Somewhere between age 3 and adulthood, we seem to lose that generous spirit and learn to be fiercely protective of our money. Jesus himself spent a large fraction of his teaching time talking and teching about money, but whenever we mention it in church – however gently – someone gets angry and stops coming to worship… Maybe it’s guilt, maybe it’s an unwillingness to submit to God’s will for us, maybe it’s even greed… I don’t know.

It wasn’t easy for us to start tithing (tithing means giving 10% of your income to the church), but Eleanor and I have been tithing for many years now – I think 2007 may be the 10th year. We have done it when we had a lot and when we had very little, and we have found ourselves freed. I feel a lot more like Johnny now. “Take my piggybank, God!” We’ve found that 10% is a starting point for us now. And our needs continue to be met in mysterious ways. I sometimes feel concerned about how I will provide for my family, but God provides. For example, a bicycle recently appeared on the front porch, for example, and we were given a set of bunk beds when we had just started shopping for them.

Life is better when we feel free to be generous and can talk about money without the tension and anger that used to accompany it. I just wish I could figure out how to communicate that to people without so much fallout…

Leave a comment if you have a suggestion! In the meantime, give thank God for your blessings and be generous!

Theologian Karl Barth urged pastors to prepare their sermons “with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other” lest the church become irrelevant and “do no earthly good.” This is what’s going on so it has to influence my choice of texts for preaching. (I’m still going to be preaching form the Bible, of course.)

The reactions I have seen to The Da Vinci Code even among Christians tell me that it is an issue we must address. How can I leave people out there thinking that Constantine invented the deity of Christ. How can I leave people believing that their faith – if they’re able to hang onto it – is based on nothing, or worse yet that the church has been misleading them for 2000 years? The use of history in The Da Vinci Code is so obviously wrong that it’s farily easy to straighten out, if people will listen.

Why the reactions? Well someone people are legitimately “creeped out” by The Da Vinci Code. The religious claims are creepy. But they’re based on misinformation. Why now know the historical truth? Why not learn the basis for the hope that lies within us? I’m not encouraging anyone (except our staff) to read the book or see the movie.

Another claim is that we should just go on with business as usual. Well that’s another problem. Americans like to compartmentalize our faith. If we let our faith and our lives touch too much, we might have to take seriously the claims that Christ makes on our lives. Now that’s scary! I don’t know how many of the protests are about that.

Well, I have to do it. It’s based on lies and it’s making some people lose their faith. Plus it gives us an opportunity to look at some basic issues like “What is the nature of scripture?” and “Who is Jesus?” We can also look at the role of women in the church. And everyone’s favorite old heresy, Gnosticism, is back again. That thing sure has nine lives.

Well, off to work on my sermon on “Is Jesus God?” It works out nicely that the next passage in John 20 (we’ve been preaching through John 18, 19, 20 over the past few months) contains Thomas’ confession that Jesus is “My Lord and my God.” Hmmmm… That’s certainly earlier than the Council of Nicaea where Constantine allegedly forced the divinity of Christ onto the Church for his own purposes…

In our young adult Bible study on Sunday, we looked at Matthew 6:33, which tells us to seek God’s kingdom first and then we’ll get the other things we need.

I was so pleased to see someone who had a number of life challenges come into my office and want to talk about God! And I wanted to help provide the other things that person needed. Another person came into my office wanting nothing but stuff. The first thing out of that person’s mouth was what our church needed to provide for them. I had no desire to go out of my way for that person.

As least based on my morning, Jesus was right. If we seek God’s kingdom first, we’ll find the other things we need too…

Many of the people I graduated from seminary with preach every week on a Bible text specified by the Revised Common Lectionary, which is a three-year pattern for preaching that includes readings from the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the New Testament epistles. There are a few passages that show up every year (e.g., the Christmas story from Luke) and a whole lot of passages that will never be read in church or preached on because they’re not part of the three-year cycle.

It has its advantages. Many Christians in different kinds of churches will hear the same passage on a given Sunday, fostering Christian unity. It makes it less likely that preachers will preach their favorite themes endlessly (thought it’s still possible:-)). But it seems to inspire fanaticism. Many lectionary preachers seem to look down on those who do not use the lectionary or seeing them as “arrogant.”

Given the support that it has, I just assumed that the Revised Common Lectionary used by many Protestants must have been based on something that had been around for hundreds of years. Nope. The Protestant version was completed in 1983 and published in 1994. The Roman Lectionary for Mass that it’s based on was just created in 1969, though before that there was a one-year cycle in the Roman Missal that included a schedule of New Testament readings (with very little Old Testament).

So why do so many people consider it so very important to preach from the lectionary? To hear some people talk, you’d think Moses brought it down from Mt. Sinai. It almost seems like idolatry… Some parts of scripture are completely excluded, including some difficult texts, while others are very heavily emphasized. And it jumps around to try to squeeze parts of a whole story into the right times of year, which can make it difficult to see the big picture of what really happened.

Personally, I do use the lectionary when I’m not preaching a sermon series and when no pastoral concerns necessitate choosing an appropriate text to address an issue. It helps me to cover things I might not have, but I don’t find that it works particularly well for me to use it for long periods of time.

I hope you will comment on this. I’d like to know how people feel about this.

Anyway, they tell you that most cases last 3-5 days. No problem. I could manage that and my pastoral duties. I tried to decide how long the trial would have to be before I’d have a problem. Maybe 3 weeks. Doing two full-time jobs would get pretty old by then, and I need to be able to visit hospitals, attend weekday meetings, and perform weekday memorial services from time to time.

So I arrived at the courtroom. And they told us that this case was going to last four… “Four weeks!” I thought. Can I do it? “four months for the first phase,” the judge continued. The whole trial could last six months. It turned out to be a double homicide with special circumstances. That meant the jury would have to decide on the death penalty should the defendants be found guilty.

Needless to day, I filled out the hardship excuse form. But none of the legally accepted categories seemed to fit my case exactly. Not sure whether I would be excused or not, I spent one of the longest hours of my life going over my view of capital punishment. Was it consistent? Was it biblical? Could I defend it? If they didn’t excuse me, I would need to be able to discuss my position intelligently.

I started by searching for “put to death” on the King James Bible I keep on my Palm handheld organizer. (Try it on Bible Gateway.) Lots of stuff came up. Everything from murder to stealing to adultery to cursing one’s parents to working on the sabbath. There are lots more. By these standards, most children would have to be put to death at least a couple of times. So the Law of Moses was pretty keen on the death penalty, but it didn’t limit it to murder with special circumstances.

But in John 8:1-11 when Jesus was faced with deciding whether a woman caught in adultery (remember – that’s on my list of capital offenses in the Bible), he did something different. He said, “”If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” No one could. Then Jesus told her to “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

Jesus was in a unique position to interpret the Law, since he was part of its writing. I wasn’t. But still, Jesus came to fulfill the Law. He took the penalty on himself. So how can we use the biblical mandates for capital punishment as justification for doling out that penalty now? I know that a large number of convictions have been overturned since DNA evidence became available. How many other mistakes have we made? The death penalty is irreversible. Also, a much higher percentage of African Americans and poor people are sentenced to death than white people or wealthy people. Is that justice?

The thought of having to decide whether someone should live or die based on a few short months of testimony and presentations of evidence made me sick to my stomach. “No,” I decided. It’s not right.

Just as I found that I did have a consistent position, a court official came in and began to read the list of names of those who had asked to be excused. He began, “Stephen Whitney… excused.” I wouldn’t have to determine these men’s fate. But I had an unusual chance to examine my convictions when it wasn’t just an intellectual exercise. It’s amazing how much motivation and clarity that can provide.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m very glad that I was excused – for a number of reasons – but I am also thankful for the experience of that day in the courthouse.

The latest is “open theism.” In this theory, God doesn’t know the future because it hasn’t been determined yet. God is still all-powerful and all-knowing, but God doesn’t know the future because it’s undetermined.

See any problems yet? I do. God is the creator of the universe and part of that universe is time. Jesus even said it himself, “Before Moses was, I am.” God is not stuck in the flow of time with us. And if God exists outside of time, there’s not such thing as “not yet.” God can see all of human history simultaneously.

Looked at that way, “open theism” doesn’t even make sense. Try again, guys.

What’s my theory? I don’t think God ever answers the question “Why?” What the Bible and Jesus himself tell us about God is that God loves us unconditionally and wants the best for everyone. We know that God will provide for us. We also know that human beings can temporarily mess up God’s plan but that God’s will will be done in the end. (See the “parable of the tenants” in Luke 20:9-18 for an example.)

We’re never going to understand the “why” question this side of eternity, but God asks for our faith and trust and promises us love and protection. Living in the tension is harder but much more satisfying than seeking after easy answers.

I’m going to try another preaching log post but a shorter one – just one idea instead of all of them.

Last Sunday, I preached on Acts 1:1-11. The book of Acts is really the story of the Christian Church and those who helped it to grow. This passage talks about Jesus ascending into heaven after his resurrection. He’s spent some time on earth teaching those he would send out – his apostles. But as he gets ready to go, he finds that they still don’t understand the plan. “OK, Jesus, are you finally going to fix the political situation around here and restore the kingdom to your Chosen People?” they ask (paraphrased, of course).

He answers that when he restores the kingdom isn’t really any of their concern, but… but they will receive power from above. “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

Jesus wasn’t going to come in and unilaterally bring in his kingdom. Could he have done it? Sure. But he decided to let us play a role in his work. It’s like the times that I let my son John help me with home repair tasks like patching stucco or fixing the fence. Do I need his help? No. But he takes such great joy in helping his daddy and learning to do the things that his daddy does. It’s wonderful for me too. Sure, it takes longer, but I feel the same joy that he does. And we build our relationship.

That’s what happens when we work with God on the things he cares about. We learn, we find joy, and we get to know God better! And the work gets done, bringing the kingdom nearer.

It’s not quite like working with my son, though. Because Jesus promised his apostles power – through the Holy Spirit. We have that power too. I’ll be preaching (and hopefully blogging) about that over the next several weeks as I preach a sermon series called, “Sunday Words – Monday Power.”

Until then, God bless you, and may you find joy working with your Father too.

General I preach what the academics call “textual sermons.” That means that the message is primarily an interpretation of one part of the Bible. I think that’s a good way to preach, since it make it less likely that I’ll just put my own agenda out there and back it up with one-liners from the Bible.

Anyway, on February 27, 2005, I preached on John 4:4-42. Now you can’t preach in detail on something this long – at least not within the attention span of 21st century Americans sitting on pews! But this is a story that has to be read as a whole. So we read the passage as “readers’ theater” – with different people reading each part.

Anyway, the scene opens with Jesus entering Samaria. Now Samaria is what used to be the Northern Kingdom of Israel. I’ll tell you about this some time, but for now, know this: In Jesus’ time, the Samaritans were not well-loved by the Jews. So Jesus is entering a region where – according to Jewish customs of the time – he really wasn’t supposed to have much to do with the people.

So what does Jesus do? He strikes up a conversation with a woman who is getting water from a well. “Will you give me a drink?” he asks.

She’s shocked! From his dress and his accent, he’s obviously a Jewish man. But he’s talking to a Samaritan woman. She responds to him, asking him how he can possibly be talking to her.

Then Jesus tells her that if she really knew who he was, she would ask him for a drink and he’d give her “living water.”

Living water usually means water that came from a flowing spring rather than a well. She still doesn’t understand who he is.

The conversation continues as Jesus reveals more and more about who he is and she asks more and more important questions until she is convinced that he may be the Messiah (the coming anointed one who was supposed to set the world aright.)

In church, we went through the exchanges between the two of them, but here, let’s cut to the chase. Jesus offered this woman “living water,” saying “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” When she eventually figures out that he’s not trying to offer her indoor plumbing or a new water delivery service, she’s overcome and leaves her water jar there to go tell her friends.

What we didn’t talk about is who this woman was. I told you she was a Samaritan woman. That’s one strike against her. Then she had been married five times. Generally, three times was the limit of the number of times a woman could be married except under very unusual conditions. Strike two. Then told Jesus that she wasn’t married to the man she now lives with – at all! Strike three. By the standards of his culture, Jesus shouldn’t have been relating to this woman at all.

Why did he go to her? Of all the people in Samaria, surely there was someone who would be a better ambassador for Jesus than this woman! But no. Jesus comes to us as we are. He doesn’t see us as the world sees us. John’s gospel tells us that everything in all creation was made through Jesus. So have to fugue he sees us as we really are. But he’s not afraid to offer living water to an outcasts or someone who feels like a fraud, or someone who has a dark secret, or someone who’s angry at God… The list goes on and on.

There are as many problems as there are people. But Jesus comes to each of us, offering his living water. Will we take a drink?